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20081211

On this page, we maintain a log of the court-cases pending against Afrikaners - especially farmers... but also highly-decorated military officers and skilled, experienced Afrikaner policemen, victimised, criminalised and marginalised by the ANC-regime and dragged into law courts on a large variety of charges. This is a pattern of persecution by the ANC-regime which occurs countrywide, and often involves trumped-up charges.

"You white sh*t, you are going to die here with your money. We will make sure you never leave this country, you will die here first...'

This is what a Kyalami businessman was told when he was assaulted by a black female cop - video:

11 December 2008 - article by Cecil Motsepe - PICTURE CAPTIONS: READY TO POUNCE: Policemen wait outside the house of farmer Derick Steyn, right, to arrest him for allegedly intimidating witnesses. Steyn was, however, not present when the police arrived. PHOTO: VATHISWA RUSELO FACE OFF : Steyn’s daughter hides her face from the camera Derick James Steyn

ARTICLE by SOWETAN " Terror farmer Derick James Steyn is on the run after police raided his farm yesterday. Steyn, who is out on R1000 bail in connection with an assault case, is wanted by police for intimidating witnesses. A convoy of five police vehicles drove about 15km to Meyerton and pulled up outside Steyn’s vast farm. About 12 heavily armed officers, led by Meyerton police commissioner Superintendent Mncedisi Mabala, emerged. But Steyn’s surprised family refused to let the police into the property. Standing behind a high electric fence, Steyn’s daughter said he was out ploughing in one of his surrounding farms.She called him on the cellphone: “Pa, die polisie soek na jou (police are here looking for you).” After incoherently mumbling a few more words in Afrikaans, the visibly terrified teenager turned to the police and said: “He says you can wait for him. He will be here in no time.”But the convicted criminal hotfooted it. This forced Mabala to phone him. “Mr Steyn, this is Superintendent Mabala. Can you come around because we want to arrest you?” to which Steyn replied: “I am not coming.” Mabala continued: “No problem Mr Steyn, we will come for you.” Meyerton police spokesman Constable Makgauta Serathi said when police finally catch up with Steyn, they will confiscate his three guns.'(ARTICLE CONTINUES:)

" Sowetan has reported that Steyn is accused of terrorising the local black community with impunity – allegedly because he enjoys the protection of the local magistrate, Marius Serfontein. Steyn was arrested after his domestic worker, Thembi Ndlovu, accused him of assaulting her.Our investigations revealed that Steyn has no less than six cases against him, including two of attempted murder. Some had been mysteriously withdrawn. Yesterday, the National Prosecuting Authority ordered that Serfontein be removed from hearing all cases of black people involving white people. This is while the Magistrate’s Commission probes Serfontein’s relationship with the criminal Steyn. It has been claimed that Serfontein has been applying different judgments when dealing with blacks and whites, with blacks getting a raw deal. This led to Ndlovu’s lawyer, Godfrey Machimana, successfully applying for the case to be moved to the Vereeniging magistrate’s court. According to court records, Steyn has at least three previous convictions.http://www.sowetan.co.za/News/Article.aspx?id=902823 "

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RAWSONVILLE 5 DECEMBER 2008

Nov 24 2008 - RAWSONVILLE, WESTERN CAPE. Afrikaner farmer Hennie du Preez of the farm Excelsior was arrested with six employees on October 20. The case, Nr RV699/08, was remanded to 5 December in the Rawsonville law court, writes Rapport journalist Julian Jansen, who also took the picture of worker Manie Thomas, 23 on the left. The worker lodged formal charges of assault, pointing a firearm and kidnapping against Du Preez, Rapport newspaper wrote. The alleged beating occurred on October 6. It's not known why it took the farm worker two weeks before lodging the complaint. The truth will all hopefully emerge during the trial. "Someone is behind these stories" - read: http://censorbugbear-reports.blogspot.com/2008/11/white-farmers-must-be-dealt-with-warn.html

'Rawsonville farmers demonised' plot against 4 arrested farmers

April 2006 -- There's indeed ample evidence that such arrests of white farmers are politically-motivated and orchestrated with false testimony. One such plot to demonise and criminalise white South African farmers was indeed uncovered in April 2006 in Rawsonville, after four white farmers were arrested in a blaze of international media attention, accused of gang-raping a female farm worker and beating a youth into a coma. read: Rape charges against four white Rawsonville farmers were fraudulent

These charges all came from one source: farm worker Annelise Davids - and she confessed shortly thereafter that she had lied 'because she'd been drunk;'. Her friend Beverley van Rooyen was then forced - with torture by a cattle prong -- to write a statement claiming she had seen the rapes of her friend. This torture was carried out by a Ceres police inspector, Matthew Ntshanga. He has since been charged with interfering with the judicial process. He still keeps his job. Davids also admitted that she had lied to the police about these same four farmers having beaten a local youth, Anthony Ntonzeni, leaving him in a coma. The police directorate investigation determined independently that this youngster had been left permanently brain-damaged after falling off a vehicle and that the farmers had not been anywhere near the scene at the time.

The two female farm workers were never charged at all -- and have never apologised to the four white farming families, either. A huge amount of hate-speech was generated in South Africa and abroad against these four accused white farmers at the time - and in fact land-rights campaigners still cite this case to this day at their public meetings and protests as 'an example of the cruelty which racist white farmers show towards their workers'...when none of these events had ever happened..."

Four white farm families went through hell...got death threats:

Meanwhile the four white farm families have been through hell, they said. "Nobody involved in this case has ever apologised to the families. The least which Davids could have done, was to apologise on a public platform about the harm which was done to our families,' one of the farmers told Rapport.

An independent investigation was launched by the Women on Farms Project, said its deputy-director Colette Solomons. This organisation -- funded by the Ford Foundation, Sida, the Heinrich Böll Foundation and the Open Society Foundation -- held a dramatic protest march on Saturday, August 9 2008 in Rawsonville, protesting 'against the lack of access to land for women, and stating that they 'are claiming back the land that was stolen from our mothers and fathers." They had gathered at the Rawsonville police station and marched to the nearby Merwiede Farm. They claimed: "On the six farms owned by the van der Merwes assaults on farm workers are common-place. One woman cooperative member has been assaulted twice by a foreman and no action was taken..." http://lists.mindspring.co.za/pipermail/pgmwc/2008-August/000020.html

VRYBURG DEC 12 2008

Nov 22 2008 VRYBURG, NW - Beeld journalist Linda de Beer and Rapport newspaper's Maryna van Wyk reported from Vryburg that the Afrikaner smallholder/motor mechanic Nic van Rensburg, left on picture by Rapport, was arrested after a local worker, Piet Mopelwa, had allegedly died of 'alcohol poisoning' in January this year. Van Rensburg's legal counsel Adv. Kammie Strydom told journalists outside the courtroom Friday that Mopelwa had died of pneumonia instead. "It could not have been alcohol-poisoning: the alcohol had already been secreted from his body by the time he'd died,' said Strydom. Forensic tests are still being awaited as to the exact way in which Mopelwa may have died. Accusations are rife that Van Rensburg's worker had allegedly been tortured by electric shocks and forced to drink two bottles of brandy. Van Rensburg was released on R2,000 and his case was remanded to 12 December by the Ganyesa/Vryburg magistrate's court. Police captain Charlize van der Linden confirmed that charges were lodged against the farmer/businessman. Apparently Mopelwa was one of the two state-witnesses in another murder charge against Van Rensburg - which trial continues in January 2008. In this case he's charged with murdering a man from Amalia in 2004, Samual Gaoshubele, who allegedly went missing after going to Rensburg's homestead to complain about a car he'd bought from him. Gaoshubele's sister Dinkwe Mofokeng was quoted by Rapport as saying that her brother had been 'afraid shortly before his death and was receiving threatening anonymous phone calls. from a man' Two black workers, including Mopelwa had testified in the Gaoshubele case that the man had been 'tied to a tree.' However Gaoshubele's wallet and remains of a human skeleton later identified forensically as his, were later found alongside a road. The local community has meanwhile taken the law into their own hands by attacking Van Rensburg's property. On this picture he is seen talking about this attack. Picture by RAPPORT newspaper. http://www.news24.com/Beeld/Suid-Afrika/0,,3-975_2430727,00.htmlhttp://www.news24.com/Rapport/Suid-Afrika/0,,752-2460_2431009,00.html

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BADPLAAS - Two local Afrikaner cops have been placed on a death-list by ANC local-level leaders, and their names are shouted from public platforms - AND they are inciting local blacks to 'kill all the racist whites of Badplaas' - see story here:

COLIGNY

Coligny police announced the arrests of three Shangaan-speaking suspects, charged with the assassination-style farm-murder of Sias Stander on his Coligny farm last week. The question still remains whether farm wife Hannetjie Stander, 67, will now be arrested for 'murder' and 'attempted murder,' after she'd managed to shoot dead one attacker, Ernest Vilakazi of Mozambique and injuring another Shangaan-speaking man seriously after she had already been stabbed eleven times...

The three arrested Shangaan-speaking men, Samuel Katgetla, 26; Sergio Masibela, 26, of Mozambique and Patrick Malebo, 28, LEFT, this week appeared in the Coligny magistrate's court as suspects in the execution-style murder of local farmer Sias Stander last week. Their trial starts Nov 17 and they remain in custody. Police identified the killed farm-attacker as Mozambiquan migrant Ernest Vilakazi, 34. It's not yet known whether the badly traumatised elderly farm-wife will now be charged with murder and attempted murder for killing Vilakazi and injuring his comrade. The current record shows that such arrests of Afrikaner farm-attack victims often follow such self-defence deaths... In fact the State has had to fork over millions of Rands in compensation over the past few years to falsely-arrested Afrikaner farmers and other white citizens, who often have to spend long, often very traumatic stays in prison, with frequent reports of being gang-raped by AIDS-infected inmates. Mr Stander was one of three farmers murdered thus far this month in very violent farm attacks in the North West province. Also murdered were farmers Brink Botha of Mamogaleskraal, 2 Nov; and Flip Minnie of Rooikoppies farm near Brits 6 Nov. http://www.news24.com/Beeld/Suid-Afrika/0,,3-975_2424154,00.html

DELAREYVILLE - Murder charges dropped against farmer Jaco Swart

Also on the same day, the Delareyville magistrate's court dropped the murder-charge against local farmer Jaco Swart, 26, arrested in May this year after shooting dead farm-attacker Michael Thipe and injuring one of of Thipe's comrades while they were attacking his parental homestead. The court refused to try the case: it was scrapped off the roll because Swart 'had acted in self-defence', said the magistrate. Afriforum community-security spokesman Nantes Kelder said this latest dismissal of the young farmer's case 'proves that Swart was arrested illegally."The arrest was motivated purely by politics," he said. http://www.news24.com/Beeld/Suid-Afrika/0,,3-975_2424128,00.html

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OUDTSHOORN MARCH 9 2009

Nov 10 2008 - OUDTSHOORN, Karoo. The Circuit Court in Oudtshoorn this week also viewed a gruesome video of 13-year-old farmworker's child Elizabeth Martiens‘s decomposing body where it was found in an empty water tank on one of the three sheep farms owned by accused farmer Piet Botes. Elizabeth was last seen alive when Botes drove off with her from his Karoo sheep farm Weltevrede in April last year, according to this report. He has pleaded not guilty, claiming that he had dropped Elizabeth off next to her mother‘s house in Merweville, but that the girl never arrived there. Her remains were found on Weltevrede farm three months later, a day after police arrested Botes on charges of 'child abandonment'. Case postponed to March 9 2009 - HE STAYS IN JAIL:

This case is however complicated by the fact that Botes' own brother has testified against him - and we are still awaiting more details before it can be determined whether Botes' case follows the same demonisation pattern, or whether this had been a genuine criminal event. Even though Botes is the owner of three local sheep-farms, an income-earner with a fix-abode and no previous criminal record, Botes was ordered to remain in Oudtshoorn prison for the next five months: his case was postponed to March 9 2009. It's not known whether bail was ever applied for - the news reports don't say, but we are awaiting results from our own enquiries. The video screened in the courtroom in November 2008 showed her lifeless body lying under two zinc sheets and some of her personal items, which had been burnt.

Botes, 49, is accused of abducting and murdering the girl. He has since then also been charged with abducting and indecently assaulting two teenage sisters in 2006 after finding them gathering wood on another of his three farms. Their names were not published in this report, nor is it known whether he pleaded guilty to these last two charges.

Botes family distraught, mother grief-stricken: His brother, Frans, testified earlier that Piet had confessed to him that he ' had something to do with Elizabeth‘s death." The defence attorney, unnamed in this report, did not cross-examine the brother.

Judge Vincent Saldanha and his assessors did cross-examine the brother Frans about their upbringing: Frans Botes told the judge that 'they had received a good upbringing, and that moreover their father, Frans Botes snr, had 'not been particularly strict "-- although they often got hidings, he added. Asked why he decided to testify against his brother, Frans said it was difficult, and that the charges against Piet were putting the family “through a very difficult time”.

However, he had been taught not to lie, he testified: noting that their mother, 72, was taking the situation badly and that the rest of the family was sad and tense. The case was postponed to March 9 2009. Botes will remain in custody at the Oudtshoorn prison. We will continue to monitor this case, which may or may not be related to the fact that there are six land-restitution claims pending in the Oudtshoorn region. http://www.theherald.co.za/herald/news/n08_10112008.htm

Land-claims in Oudtshoorn region:

SIX land-restitution claims were submitted all on the same day, December 24, 2004, to the Land Restitution office, for Oudtshoorn land-parcels Erven 2619, 2260, 2461, 2341, 2255 and 2277, and against the farm Die Rust. Nothing further is presently known about these land claims; who lodged them, where these (often giant) parcels are located in this arid region -- nor whether Botes' three sheep farms were included in these claims. We are still investigating whether a 'Rawsonville" situation has arisen here or not.http://www.lawlibrary.co.za/landclaims/restitutionoflandrightsact_22of1994/2004.htm

PRIESKA SEPT 18 2008

Three Afrikaners in Prieska had an 'unfair trial' because of racist judge Frans Kgomo - Supreme court of appeal

Bloemfontein, South Africa. - Sept. 18 2008 -- The Supreme Court of Appeal (on Thursday agreed with three Afrikaner men, Joseph le Grange, son Pieter and a friend Hendrik van der Westhuizen of Prieska, that they did not have a fair trial. The Supreme Court of Appeal ruled that the court proceedings against the three men were 'invalid' and that the convictions and sentences imposed on them could not stand.

The SCA also ruled that the men should be retried - but that this time, Northern Cape Judge President Frans Kgomo - left -- was not allowed to preside over the matter. Judge Nathan Ponnan said in the judgment that when 'taken cumulatively, I have no doubt that ... the learned judge-president was not fair and impartial during the trial'. The found that Kgomo ... showed a clear personal prejudice against the Afrikaner defendants.

The SCA upheld the appeal brought by Joseph le Grange, found guilty of murder by Kgomo, and his son Pieter and Van der Westhuizen, who were convicted of being accessories after the fact to murder. Kgomo had sentenced Le Grange senior to 24 years in prison, while the other two were sent to prison for six and five years respectively.

The matter relates to the death of a 13-year-old Prieska boy in March 2004. He had been stabbed with a sword hidden inside a walking stick.The boy, who died in hospital, was allegedly confronted by the Afrikaner men for stealing. The SCA 's appeal hearing - heard by a full bench -- did not consider the merits of the murder itself, but focused solely on certain alleged irregularities in the course of the trial.

It held that the three Afrikaner men did not have a fair trial and that the proceedings before Judge Pres. Frans Kgomo were invalid.

The SCA set aside the convictions and sentences and remitted the matter to the Kimberley High Court, ordering that proceedings in respect of the same offence may again be instituted. They found that during the trial an application for Kgomo's recusal had been launched by these defendants - and had been refused. "He (Kgomo) sought, it would seem, from time to time to expedite the hearing of the matter by virtually taking over the prosecution from counsel for the State," the judgement read. However, the SCA found that in doing that it appeared that judge president Kgomo had 'at times overlooked the judge's usual role in a trial and had associated himself too closely with the conduct of the case. ' http://www.news24.com/News24/South_Africa/News/0,,2-7-1442_2395637,00.html

AFRIKANER MILITARY and -POLICE OFFICERS PERSECUTED

Pietermaritzburg Oct 19 2008 - The convictions and sentences of two senior 121 Battallion officers - arrested in front of their men amidst a blaze of publicity in 2004, and who had lost their jobs after their convictions -- were set aside by Appeals Court judges Nic van der Reyde and Piet Koen. It's not yet clear whether these Afrikaner officers would now get back their jobs -- with back-pay, as the law requires.

Ex-commander of 121 Battallion near Mtubatuba, lt-col Tobie van Eeden (45, left), and its former judicial officer maj. Ferdinand Labuschagne (39) were cleared of all charges stemming from false accusations which had been made by a black driver, rifleman M Sithole, that the Afrikaner officers had conspired to kill a black 21 Battallion officer (who has since died of AIDS).

Originally, four Afrikaner officers were arrested in the most distressing circumstances possible for senior military men: in front of the entire 121 Battallion near St. Lucia in 2004. Two were cleared, but LtCol Louis van Eeden, officer commanding of 121 Battalion and its judicial officer Maj Ferdinand Labuschagne were convicted for 'defeating the ends of justice' by regional magistrate L Naidoo in the Eskhawini court near Richard's Bay in November 2004. Each was fined R4 000, or two years jail, plus five years jail suspended. And of course, they also lost their jobs.

"Magistrate Naido had closed his mind...'

Judge Van der Reyden said in his Appeals Court summary setting aside their convictions that magistrate Naidoo had "closed his mind to the probability that a black driver, rifleman M Sithole, could ever have falsely implicated the two white officers, i.e. Bronkhorst and Goosen, accusing them of conspiring to murder the second in command, Maj M Manekwane.' The main witness in the conspiracy case against Bronkhorst and Goosen had been Rifleman M Sithole yet, the Appeal Court noted, this sole witness had "submitted three conflicting statements" which should have been examined more closely by magistrate Naidoo...

Black driver was 'forced to falsely implicate the Afrikaner officers' -- he testified:

The state had accused Van Eeden and Labuschagne of 'influencing Sithole to retract a first formal statement to the police in which he 'd alleged that the two other Afrikaner officers, Bronkhorst and Goosen, had ' plotted to murder Manekwane."

Legal officer Labuschagne had taken Sithole to a Mtubatuba SAPS officer after this first statement, where Sithole had retracted it -- claiming that he had been forced to falsely implicate Bronkhorst and Goosen in the plot to kill Manekwane. When Sithole's retracting statement was handed to a prosecutor she had told the SAPS investigating officer of Sithole' second statement.

That very same evening the police had obtained a third statement from Sithole in which he retracted his second statement and said his first statement implicating Bronkhorst and Goosen had been true.

In his judgment at the time, magiistrate Naidoo had said "this case has all the characteristics of a tragic play where the prejudices, bias and so forth based on race kinmanship, partisanship and other prejudices are rife, and were indeed exposed."

However, noted Judge Van der Reyden, "one would have expected a regional magistrate to approach the case with an objective and open mind.

"However he (Naidoo) did not do so. He lost sight of the fact that Sithole's two statements revealed two possible plots - a conspiracy of white officers to get rid of Manekwane and/or a conspiracy by black officer officers to get rid of white officers.

"It is clear that this magistrate had closed his mind to the probability that Sithole had falsely implicated Bronkhorst and Goosen, that he went to Labuschagne of his own volition and disclosed to him the falsity of his third statement and that his second statement retracting his first statement reflected the true position.This oversight by the magistrate resulted in him defining the main plot solely based on the state case.'

"He also overlooked the fact that a finding that Sithole went to Labuschagne on his own volition and told him the true position - that he had falsely implicated Bronkhorst and Goosen - could only have one outcome: an acquittal on the charge of defeating the course of justice," Van der Reyden said. Judge Koen concurred. - Sapa

PIETERSBURG

Senior Limpopo detective Johan Fourie fights to get job back - 5 years after he was cleared of trumped-up 'theft' charges

Pietersburg - This is Senior Superintendent Johan Fourie, one of Limpopo province's most senior and experienced police detectives, who has been waging a five-year battle -- doing odd-jobs to stay alive -- trying to regain his job rights via the law courts.

Five years ago, he was unceremoniously arrested without any arrest warrant after an amount of R109,000 in cash had allegedly 'gone missing'. However, this recovered cash had been paid over by the police immediately to the security company it had been robbed from.

The following internal police investigation had found him innocent of any wrong-doing when it was found his commanding officer senior superintendent Benny Nkuna had ordered the investigating police officer to 'keep quiet about the statement from the security company that there was no missing cash'.

Yet five years later, Fourie -- totally innocent -- is still fighting to get his job and R1million in backpay restored to him. He says he is being victimised by the deliberate delaying tactics of Senior superintendent Benny Nkuna and asked the Human Rights Commission to investigate the inequal way he is being treated by police management.

One of the country's most dedicated cops is now keeping body and soul together by repairing TV-antennas and installing kitchen-cabinets. Five years ago, he was the officer in charge of the organised crime unit in Limpopo and solved several high-profile cases, including important farm murders for which he was featured on the Carte Blanche programme "A Bloody Harvest'.

He's one of the best-trained detectives in the country. Now Fourie has asked for his police-pension to be paid out so that he can pay for his legal costs for his forthcoming Labour Court hearing which started in October 2008 - because the police legal-aid fund he'd been paying his fees to all those years, also refused to help him with the court costs...

The 'fraud' case which had been lodged against him and four colleagues was scrapped off the court rolls within just days, proven to be trumped-up charges, but police management now keeps lodging appeals to keep the Afrikaner policeman suspended without pay and in limbo.

The internal police investigation has cleared him, the police personnel-board has ordered Fourie's immediate reinstatement with back pay -- but senior superintendent Benny Nkuna has lodged yet another appeal against this latest decision. Fourie says these are all delaying tactics to keep him off his job and without an income. Fourie is becoming increasingly bitter about the way he's being treated by police management. He has always been innocent, yet he's being treated like dirt. "Police management's willfull actions against me have ruined me financially. I am being victimised,' he said. He feels that the public prosecutor's office and the Human Rights Commission should investigate these human rights violations against him. http://www.news24.com/Rapport/Nuus/0,,752-795_2377292,00.html

RUSTENBURG

23/07/2008 Linda de Beer, Beeld - Rustenburg - A hunting trip turned into a nightmare for a former police officer when he was kept in a crowded cell for a weekend for trumped up 'crimen injuria' charges, along with people who assaulted him and wanted to rape him.These cellmates also ejaculated into his drinking water. Due to this hell he's had indured in the police cell, and after he was threatened with another seven days just like it, he pleaded guilty on June 30 in Madikwe Magistrate's Court to a charge of crimen injuria. His lawyer is now appealing against this verdict because it was extracted under extreme duress.

Until March, Van der Mescht had been the police's appointed firearm official in Rustenburg. He works at present as a security manager for a hotel group. The 37-year-old Afrikaner was stripped naked and assaulted repeatedly in the cells by inmates. He also was stabbed in the head with a knife and another sharp object. His cellmates also tried to rape him, but he fought with all his might to prevent this. A knife was held to his genitals while the men threatened to cut them off.

After this, he had to sit on the cold cell floor for a long time before his clothes were given back to him, said Van der Mescht on Monday. Van der Mescht, a father of two, did not eat or drink anything for the whole weekend: his cellmates apparently ejaculated into the water that was offered to him. He said the police visited the cell only once every morning and once every evening.

Since his experience at the end of June, nightmares have been preventing Van der Mescht from sleeping. His lawyer, Carl Arnold, said they were waiting on the test results for HIV and other sexually transmitted infections because of the dirty knife that was used on Van der Mescht.

On June 27, Van der Mescht was part of a group who went hunting in the Madikwe Trust area. He was at their camp when two fellow hunters in a bakkie were stopped by police.They were unable to show the licence of another hunter's firearm that was in the car.

After an assurance that someone would go to show them the licence, the police left without taking further action. Arnold said Van der Mescht -- until March the Rustenburg police's former firearm-license officer -- and another man drove after the police with the other hunter's firearm licence and identity document, but they repeatedly ignored him when he tried to show the documents to them.

Van der Mescht and the driver of the bakkie he was in, then stopped at a place where a few police vehicles were standing next to the road. Some of the police officers apparently spotted him and stormed at Van der Mescht. The door of the bakkie was yanked open and he was jerked out by the arm. Van der Mescht said he told them he did not appreciate their actions.

At that, he was thrown into the back of a police van. They apparently drove around with him for more than an hour before he was taken to Madikwe police station. He said: "I was arrested for crimen injuria and intimidation."

Van der Mescht's wife was rudely chased from the police station when she wanted to see her husband on the Saturday, she told the news-media. She apparently also was threatened with arrest. On June 30, Van der Mescht was forced to plead guilty in Madikwe Magistrate's Court under extreme duress to a charge of crimen injuria, after he was threatened 'with another seven days in the cells.'

North West police's Captain Aafje Botma claimed that 'Van der Mescht threatened and swore at the police officer when they were driving next to each other' and that the former police officer 'was taken to a hospital for treatment'.She also denied that his wife had been kept from visiting him -- and said police 'had visited the cells every hour...' However, Botma was at a loss to answer a question about how a sharp object got into the prisoners' cell. http://www.news24.com/News24/South_Africa/News/0,,2-7-1442_2362959,00.html

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RUSTENBURG

Rustenburg. – June 8 2007 - Harry Halgryn and fiancee Gwen Maritz of Rustenburg became victims twice on June 8 2007. Their ordeal started after all his valuables, documents, bank-cards and money were stolen from their locked bakkie while they were staying at a guest house. Harry had kept his (legally-registered) gun on him, so they didn't steal that...

After the guest farm manager had notified police of the robbery by telephone, a heavily-armed police force showed up -- but only the next day. They refused to identify themselves - instead roughly arresting the robbery victim, Mr Halgryn for a clarly inaccurate charge: 'having an unlicensed firearm." They had no arrest warrant. Harry said a constable Kgapola claimed to be in charge of taking him to the police station in Witbank, but after stopping there he then was rushed at breakneck speed to Middelburg, where Harry was kept in a police cell overnight. He says here, female policers continuously and he said very rudely, refused to respond to his repeated requests to verify his gun-registration at the computerised central registry office - which they could easily have done. The confiscated firearm is meanwhile, still is lodged in a police safe in Middelburg after he was released on bail via a court appearance the next day.

Sexually harassed by black female cops:Halgryn also said that while he was in the police cell, female police officers had entered the cell and 'sexually tormented' him. He and his fiancee have been so traumatised by the events that both now are undergoing trauma-councelling. He's lodged formal charges with the police complaints directorate and said his human rights and those of his fiancee have been 'grossly violated'. http://www.news24.com/Beeld/Mpumalanga/0,,3-2034_2153984,00.html

VEREENIGING

Afrikaans protest-singer Theuns Jordaan illegaly arrested

Aug 18 2007 -- Beeld newspaper -- Afrikaans protest-singer Theuns Jordaan was falsely arrested after a musical performance in Vereeniging. He had refused to pull over for an unmarked civilian BMW car with flashing lights which had followed him and his assistant from his performance -- fearing he was being hijacked. The driver of the car tried to push him off the road and had not identified himself as an off-duty police officer. Jordaan as then arrested in a police roadblock allegedly for 'reckless driving' while he tried to evade the unmarked BMW-car, which he and his assistant said had had tried to run his car off the road. See his music on YouTube: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ruqvySlNwFI

The unarmed Jordaan was arrested at gun-point, and was first held in the Brackendowns-police cells for 4 hours and then taken to Alberton police-cells. Blood was drawn by the police against his permission - and these tests proved he was sober. An emergency bail application was lodged by his attorney at around 6am after his assistant had raised the alarm, fearing he'd be gang-raped in the police cells. http://www.news24.com/Beeld/Suid-Afrika/0,,3-975_2166812,00.html

ESKOM gets list of 2,800 skilled, unemployable Afrikaner-engineers

10/02/2008 - Johannesburg - Freedom Front Plus leader Dr Pieter Mulder has presented Eskom, the state utility, with a huge candle and the political party's database of 1,800 highly-skilled, unemployable, paler-skinned South Africans. WE offerr Eskom the services of hundreds of skilled South Africans who would have loved to be employed by them, but for the limitations of 'affirmative action' practices," said the FF+.

SA Human Rights Commission, report on Tony Ehrenreich, West Cape leader of Cosatu, alleged hate-speech: The SAHRC wrote that "Mr Ehrenreich was accused that he'd incited violence against 'boere', which is a term that, directly translated from Afrikaans into English, means 'farmers'. That the term also has a dual meaning in Afrikaans, specifically that of a DEROGATORY TERM ... commonly understood as 'referring to a White Afrikaner minority group which historically and politically has been regarded as suppressors of the non-white farm workers - should not be overlooked...' The call by Mr Ehrenreich was made specifically in response to and against those 'boere' (farmers) who abuse and mistreat there (sic) workers. .. The farmers denied the allegations of rape and assault... The fact that the farm worker later admitted that she lied and that the rape never occurred, does not minimize the harm suffered by these farmers... Mr Ehrenreich's statement used extreme language including words and expressions such as 'moer", "war", "mad dogs", "blood on the farms" "take the land" and so forth. ..(...) in light of the above, it is the SAHRC's opinion that Mr Ehrenreich's utterances LACK A CLEAR INTENTION to be hurtful, harmful, incite harm or to promote or propagate hatred...' and do not amount to hate-speech...' http://www.sahrc.org.za/sahrc_cms/downloads/AgriWes%20Cape_finding.pdf

Leaders of civil organisations have called for an urgent end to what they believe is an "orchestrated campaign" to denigrate and vilify farmers with a view to driving them off their land. Agricultural leaders, opposition politicians and the FW de Klerk Foundation have called for the demonisation of farmers to stop, after a Rawsonville woman this week admitted she had made up claims that she had been raped and a youth beaten by four Rawsonville farmers. The Human Rights Commission will meet farmers and workers in the Rawsonville area to try to defuse a volatile situation. The Commission is also investigating a charge of hate speech laid against Cosatu and the Women on Farms organisation over "crude and racist comments" made at a meeting held in the area last year. Women on Farms has in turn laid a complaint of "general" human rights infringements in the area. Dave Steward, executive director of the FW de Klerk Foundation, said Davids's retraction of the charge that she was raped by four Rawsonville farmers could not be seen in isolation, nor could it be dismissed lightly. "The charges, which were vociferously supported by Women on Farms and Cosatu, have now been shown by subsequent investigation and Ms Davids's own retraction to have been perjurious and without foundation. "MEC Cobus Dowry's subsequent calls on the community to desist with such allegations have nevertheless been met with calls by activist organisations for his resignation.

"These and other developments would suggest that there is an orchestrated campaign to denigrate and vilify farmers with a view to driving them off their land. This situation has been aggravated by (Cosatu's) Tony Ehrenreich's recent call for farm invasion in Hout Bay and by radio advertisements by the minister of agriculture appealing to farmers not to evict farm workers over the festive season. AgriSA has denied that there is any such tendency. "These developments have inevitably contributed to a general climate of hostility against farmers. The recent brutal murder of a farm manager in KwaZulu-Natal tragically illustrates the importance of not contributing to this inflammatory climate." Robin Carlisle, DA spokesperson on corruption, said the manner the Rawsonville rape claims had been dealt with smacked of "moral corruption". He criticised Ehrenreich's refusal to back down in the light of Davids's retraction. "Any South African who under-estimates the serious consequences of the racist and irrational statement made by Tony Ehrenreich and others, is living in a fool's paradise. "That a tale of rape and torture is deliberately concocted and promoted by certain organisations and individuals and then supported in the face of all evidence to the contrary, is an indication of the lengths that some will go to drive up racial hatred particularly against white farmers."

Christof Cloete, chair of Agri Western Cape, said the unfounded allegations were tearing the Rawsonville community apart." "We have laid a charge of hate speech against Ehrenreich and Women on Farms after a call for all-out war to be declared against farmers during a meeting held at Rawsonville last year. Several other crude and vicious allegations were levelled at farmers. "This is a very unhappy situation. We cannot allow our members to be humiliated and denigrated. '

The term "genocide" was coined by legal scholar Raphael Lemkin in 1943, writing:

'Generally speaking, genocide does not necessarily mean the immediate destruction of a nation, except when accomplished by mass killings of all members of a nation. It is intended rather to signify a coordinated plan of different actionsaiming at the destruction of essential foundations of the life of national groups, with the aim of annihilating the groups themselves.

The objectives of such a plan would be the disintegration of the political and social institutions, of culture, language, national feelings, religion, and the economic existence of national groups, and the destruction of personal security, liberty, health, dignity and lives of the members of such groups... '